My current crazy idea? Connecting 200+ Portland community dots. Not with a happy hour or some form of cursory small talk. But, instead, with truly interesting and meaningful connections — live and in person.

But in order to do that, I could use your help. Actually, I absolutely need your help. Because this isn’t so much one of those personal goal things. It’s a goal thing that requires your participation. You know, so I have at least 200 people to connect.

I’m all about creating connections in our community. The more connected we are, the better. When we reach 200 patrons, I’d love to try to gather all of my amazing patrons together, again. But this time, I’ll do a bunch of homework on each of the attendees so that we can make the gathering less a game of chance and more about intentional and meaningful connections among folks. So less happy hour. More connect-a-thon. With beverages. And snacks.

So if this sounds interesting to you and you’d like to participate. Or if you’d simply like to challenge me to pull this off. Maybe consider kicking in — quite literally — a buck. To help nudge that number up to 200 or so. (We’re currently sitting at around 100 patrons.)

Whatever the case, as an added bonus you’ll also get the random stuff I share on Patreon. And you’ll also gain access to exclusive content that I create specifically for Patreon folks. Whether they like it or not.

And you don’t have to even consider yourself part of the startup community to participate. Because that’s often better. To create more divergent connections. To expand the community. And to knit together that fabric that makes that entire ecosystem stronger.

This is just an experimental concept trying to better determine the potential value of that ad hoc community maintenance. And maybe, just maybe, a way to figure out how other folks in similar roles doing this work might find ways to support their efforts, as well.

So if it sounds interesting, great. If not, let’s just keep on keeping on. (But secretly, I’m hoping you participate.)

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Published by Rick Turoczy

More than mildly obsessed with the Portland startup community. Founder and editor at Silicon Florist. Cofounder and general manager at PIE. Follow me on Twitter: @turoczy
View all posts by Rick Turoczy

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